


intemperate, indeed

by bluecarrot



Category: 18th Century CE RPF, Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: F/M, pure sin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-26
Updated: 2016-09-26
Packaged: 2018-08-17 11:15:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8141779
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluecarrot/pseuds/bluecarrot
Summary: Burr pays a social call on Mrs Hamilton after Alexander's death.





	

**Author's Note:**

> written 9/25/2016.

After the inquest, after the arrest and tribunal and the brief, interesting moment when Congress considered the problem of executing the Vice-President for the murder of the Secretary -- Aaron Burr was released.

"Back into the wild," someone muttered.

Apparently killing Hamilton had not made him many friends. Not a new experience. He took this familiarity and his courage (or foolishness) well in hand, and went to visit the remaining Hamiltons.

The crepe was removed from the door but the servant who answered his decisive _rap_ was still in mourning weeds. Burr expected the servants to put on that sort of display; he expected Eliza would continue to wear them for the rest of her life, in a public display of grief that went far beyond conventionality.

They took him to the back parlor. A bit of rudeness, he thought, but considering the circumstances --

She entered -- a short figure in a stiff black silk who gave him an even stare and said: "Are you here to shoot another member of my family, Mr Burr?"

"Indeed, no," he said, refraining from pointing out that several of her family members had shot at him as well, and he could hardly be blamed for being a better marksmen than her dead husband. Justifiably or not, she would hold him accountable.

She shut the door.

He blinked in surprise. "Mrs Hamilton --"

"Eliza. You killed my husband; surely that's a form of intimacy that brings us to Christian nomenclature."

Burr didn't twitch at her interesting choice of words. "I came to pay my condolences, and -- "

"I'm not interested in your feelings, Mr Burr."

"I am not expressing my feelings," he told her, rather stern. "I am expressing my condolences. It's a purely social call."

Eliza considered this.

Burr resisted the urge to fidget.

"Please sit," she said at last.

\-- And Burr found he had nothing further to say. _I am sorry for shooting Alexander_ , he tried out, but that wasn't right; _I am sorry for killing him_ was a bit more accurate, but either she knew it already or she wouldn't believe him, so what was the point?

They stared at each other.

Eliza mutely twisted her hands in the voluminous silk of her skirt.

"Why didn't he apologize?" he said, finally.

"He didn't share with me the particulars of your quarrel," she said, and amended it: "The particulars of this particular quarrel."

Burr almost smiled. "He didn't share them with me, either. That was my problem -- that was what I wanted --"

"Mr Burr," she said, low. " _Please_ do not."

He fell silent again.

At last she spoke. "You must be startled that I admitted you."

"You must be equally startled that I requested admittance."

"No," she said. "No, I know enough of your character to assume you might be here, when you were freed again to do so."

He _felt_ that blow; it was like a key turning. Was he locked in or out? "Mrs Hamilton --"

"Eliza," she said, low. "I will not ask you again."

"The best I thought to do was leave a card -- a note. Condolences. _Apologies_ , if you will. I am a widower myself; I know what it means to lose one's spouse. More than that," he said. "You lost a husband last July; I myself lost Hamilton, I lost --"

A what? He stopped. Twisted his mouth.

He hadn't intended to come this far.

"Indeed, yes. I remember your wife. That," she took a deep breath, "that is the reason I accepted your call today."

"I don't follow."

"I would be offended if you did understand me at this point."

The heavy curtains were drawn shut. The day was overcast; there was no need to close them against sunlight. This parlor looked out into the gardens and she had still taken the precaution of shutting out -- who? Whose eyes? "Where are the children?"

"With my sister. Upstate."

Thank god, Angelica was out of the city. They hadn't gotten along -- and that was before he'd shot at her husband and killed her brother-in-law.

Burr cleared his throat.

Eliza said: "He said once that you were intemperate. I have never found you so."

At least, not often. "I believe he spoke out of character, possibly outside of his own true beliefs, any number of times." It was as much an excuse as he was prepared to give Hamilton for those final letters; it was more than he had intended to give. But she put him off-guard.

She did so again. "Do you miss your wife?"

He rose. "Mrs Hamilton --"

"Pardon me. Please sit -- please. I find this difficult to address." Sweat-stains on her dress, he saw, left behind by her palms. Her eyes were broad and luminous. Had she been drinking? Unthinkable.

Her fingers were shaking; she pressed them against the skirt, against her leg. "I do not make a habit of speaking to strange men about marital affairs."

"Affairs --" ( _Reynolds?_ he thought, but that wasn't it and she was going on)

"I find myself," she said, "missing my husband."

He sat down, hard.

Silence between them.

"Do you understand me, Mr Burr?"

"I understand you perfectly, madam." At least, he _hoped_ he understood -- and hoped that he did _not_ understand -- with equal fervor on both sides. "I am not entirely certain of what you would propose to -- to rectify the situation."

Her voice was low. "I have read your letters."

"Letters." His tongue was thick and stupid in his mouth. What could she have read? What had he written down? I never wrote it down, he thought wildly; Hamilton never knew -- we never spoke of it --

That did not, however, mean that Hamilton was ignorant.

Burr hadn't given any reaction except a slight widening of his eyes, but she nodded at him. "You are a man of many -- many strong -- inclinations -- and I thought, I thought we could come to some agreement. To our mutual -- our mutual -- satisfaction."

"Mrs Hamilton --"

"Eliza," she said, and the word fell out of her mouth and broke open between them: an egg with a darkly yellow yoke -- a sign of spring.

"I am not -- I _could_ not," he said. "Physically, I think I could not."

"You can think of anyone," she said. "I don't mind. I'm not insulted. It would relieve me," she said.

She said: "I believed your natural reticence would serve us. Both of us. In this sort of situation."

She said: "This is why I accepted your call."

His _reticence_ held his tongue on the words _This is unthinkable_ ; it was no longer true. What had been unthinkable five minutes ago was not so, anymore.

It remained impossible. "If I refuse you, then what? Do you go on, bringing all his friends back to your parlor, propositioning them in this manner?"

"If you refuse, what happens to me afterward is none of your concern."

If he accepted: what then? "I'm so sorry," he found himself saying, and found himself honestly feeling the accompanying emotions: grief, regret, guilt. "I can't. Truly."

Eliza, a tiny form in a broad swatch of pure unrelieved black, frowned at him; her gaze dropped to his waist, dropped lower; her eyebrows quirked up at what she saw, then gathered into a frown. "You mean that you refuse."

"I mean it is impossible." He came to her, meaning to bow slightly and press her hand and take his hat and take his leave.

She stepped forward and in front of the door before he could make further gestures towards ritualized politeness and set her mouth and said: "I will let you leave after just one more request."

"What is it?" Uneasy.

She put her hands on his face and drew him down to kiss her.

And Burr swore, and said "Fine" -- rudely enough that Eliza Hamilton laughed out loud.

 

"Think of whomever you like," she'd said, but it was surprisingly complicated; he couldn't think about his _wife_ , could he? Some things were simply beyond the pale.

\-- and pale, pale, were her shoulders beneath the thin black silk; paler were her breasts pressing against the stays, her breath rising quick --

Eliza tilted back her head and let him kiss her throat.

Burr glanced up and checked: the key was in the door. It was locked. It was _fine_.

It was not fine. Alexander was going to rise out of his grave and throttle him.

He deserved it.

He deserved this, he thought -- he _deserved_ this -- after these long months of anger and grief and the final things he'd never gotten the chance to say.

Eliza wasn't exactly eager and responsive. Inhibition? Presumably she'd only been with Alexander (he shut his eyes briefly), probably she had been a virgin (unless Alex had managed to anticipate his vows) --

Maybe -- maybe --

Okay.

"Are you certain?" he said, uncertain.

"Yes."

He searched her face for the lie. "Eliza --"

She touched his face. Her eyes were huge, the pupils bottomless; her face was very white, a spot of deep color spread over each cheekbone. "Please."

He'd never been able to resist a woman begging for sin. His character was deeply flawed; he knew it.

 

Burr shut his eyes; he couldn't look at her and do this. _Theodosia,_ he tried: another failure. Eliza's form under him, the feeling of her skin, even her scent, even the shape of her from the inside -- it was all wrong.

Still it was right -- right enough.

It helped, having his eyes shut. He didn't need to think of anyone at all.

Eliza made a noise and Burr stopped and

"No, no," she said, impatient, and he went on --

Another noise. A gasp. He kissed her, not thinking of it beforehand; she rose to meet him.

"Alex," she murmured.

 _Alex,_ he thought. Sure.

Okay, so he was feeling a little guilty after all.

But he'd always been a good actor, hadn't he? He could -- he could --

He kissed the crest of her stays and felt her react; she ran her hand down his back, spreading out her fingers and digging in the nails, murmuring again the wrong name, and this time (somewhat to his disbelief) he felt an actual reaction, unbidden.

"Let me," she said, not to him. "Let go."

Excellent advice. He thought of Alexander -- frustrating Alex, _impossible_ Alex -- his scornful expressions, how he never could hide his feelings -- his firm, mobile mouth and tired eyes, shoulders slumped as he leaned over the desk, sketching out some ridiculous idea --his hands tapping thoughtful and impatient on some stack of papers --

Still now, forever still.

Burr was sweating. He dropped his head to her collarbone and tried to collect himself a moment but she shifted her hips, stretching her legs, drawing him in closer, deeper, startling. _Alex._

They'd never been lovers. He knew about Hamilton and Laurens, everyone knew that -- what of it? If Alex had any interest in Burr, he never showed it by more than a glance, a slight flare of his pupils or a drag in his tone.

And if Burr had sometimes thought about his co-counsel, if he'd considered how his hair fell into his face and how his voice went deep and bold when he was fired on with a new thought -- if he weighed him with interest and a trace of shame he reserved only for his own misbehaviors -- what of it?

Her hair loosened under his searching fingers; her mouth did too, swelling as he bit at it, rounding open with a mute cry as he pressed into her (into him) again and again, small motions or large ones as her (his) body asked for it, as his own body responded, becoming seeking and sought. _Alexander_ he thought, and indeed they smelled something alike, it was the scent of this house; and when hands scratched at his back and clenched into the flesh of his ass, it was the same curious layering of new and well-known.

He made a noise and muffled it in softness.

Someone (Alex) locked arms around him, digging in sharp elbows; someone cried out; someone held on. There were two people together here -- there were three -- flickering in and out, a ghostly presence.

 

When he came, he could almost hear Hamilton laugh.

 

Burr found himself kissing her. He didn't want to look in her face; he didn't want to clean up and straighten up and go back through the streets to his own house; he had no idea how to process this.

And the sense of aggravation at an impulsive choice was all too familiar; hadn't he felt it since July? _Intemperate._ "Eliza -- that is -- Mrs Hamilton?"

"Help me sit up," she said; and then he helped her button the row of tiny jet beads, covering over the volume of breasts rising and falling as she breathed. He'd never see them again -- it was impossible --

So he bent down his head and bit one, gently.

"Aaron," she said, on quick intake of breath that was not quite a gasp. "I don't --"

"It's all right," he said. "That is -- _are_ you all right?"

"I am well." But her legs were shaking.

Burr helped her sit down again -- and found she would not let go of his hand.

He stuttered at her. "I am sorry for -- for --"

"No matter," she said, and "I am quite well enough to walk unassisted, now. Thank you."

 

At the door he hesitated again. "I appreciate your great kindness in accepting my visit today."

"As you said, condolence calls are a mere social convention. Entirely meaningless."

Not even a quirk of the lip. Was this sarcasm? Was it scorn? He studied her. "I will return to pay my respects -- sometime later. If that would be amenable to you, and to your family."

"That will not be necessary, Mr. Burr."

"Aaron," he said, low. "Surely."

"Good day to you," she said, polite and distant.

**Author's Note:**

> this is the only Beliza in the entire fandom (that doesn't include Alex).
> 
> *
> 
> sin with me on tumblr  
> @littledeconstruction


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